ANBOTOKO MARI AND HER CAVE

====ANBOTOKO MARI ( Mari The Lady of Anboto)====

Mari is the hero of the Basque Country. She is the queen of the Nature. She lives underground, normally in a cave in a high mountain. You can not sit at her home and you have to get out of the cave the same way you go in.
She is often represented as a woman dressed in red, also as a woman of fire, a woman tree and as a thunderbolt. When she looks like a woman she has blond straight hair and combs it with a gold comb.
She has two sons: Atabarri and Mikelatz. Atabarri represents the benign spirit but Mikelatz seems to have more negative or wild character.
Mari and her consort meet every Friday to conceive then the storm that will bring fertility to the land and people.
She changes the weather “wet” or “dry” with her presence. When she is in The Anboto it rains and when she is in Alona it´s dry. People used to gift her a ram. Women asked her for becoming pregnant.
She punishes people that don ´t take care of Nature or creates wars. Her punishment consists on taking things away.